Men, Matters & Memories
M L Kotru
There may not have been many takers for the Vishwa Hindu Parishad’s “Sankalp day”, a continuation of sorts of the aborted ‘churasi kos ki Parikarma’ aimed at revival of the Ram Mandir agitation, but there indeed would be thousands waiting to see the BJP’s Prime Ministerial hopeful, Narendra Modi unleash, the day you read this, his high-decibel 2014 poll campaign in Uttar Pradesh.
For the BJP, Uttar Pradesh, with 80 Lok Sabha seats, the largest of any State in the Union, matters a lot more as it reaches out for power this year; merely picking up the 10 seats it did the last time won’t do. Not just that but also because party leaders are convinced that UP just now is the only State were polarization is possible, given the simmering anger among younger Hindus over the alleged appeasement of Muslims by successive governments, including by the present Samajwadi dispensation. An Economic Times survey published on Thursday does indeed show the party making gains in the State, mostly at the cost of Mulayam Singh Yadav. The same survey mentions Narendra Modi as a plus in the campaign.
The recent Muzaffarnagar riots in which the Muslims were at the receiving end of Jat (Hindu) wrath, cracking the strong Muslim-Jat bonding of the past, has convinced the BJP poll managers that the Hindu vote needs to be wooed vigorously and consolidated.
And who better than Narendra Modi, touted by his RSS backed promoters as the “Hindu Hriday Samrat” (the lord of Hindu hearts, literally), to encash the Hindu “back-lash” in Uttar Pradesh and partially in Bihar as well.
Modi and his men may have invited Muslims to turn out in large numbers at his maiden poll rally in UP at Kanpur today (Oct. 19), burqas and skull caps included. The major thrust, though, must remain on the Hindu hardcore. Modi confidant. Amit Shah, who as the Gujarat Home Minister under Modi, masterminded the riots in Ahmedabad and is currently out on bail in the Ishrat Jahan fake encounter case, was specially sent to Uttar Pradesh as a Modi plenipotentiary, his real identity covered under the very ordinary label, General Secretary, UP affairs of the BJP, and has played a singular role in the consolidation of the Hindu vote.
The party hardcore in the State is trying to make the best of the Hindu disenchantment with parties like the Samajwadi, Bahujan, and, of course, the Congress which, in any case, was abandoned by UP long ago. Amit Shah has worked hard to channelise this discontent into support for the BJP. The BJP minority wing Chief in the State, Raees Ahmed says that he is not taking any chances with the Muslims, most of whom, according to him, have veered away from the secular parties post-Saharanpur riots. That’s why he has insisted that his co-religionists must feel free to wear skull caps and Muslim women wear their burqas at Saturday’s Modi show in Kanpur. He does not tell you, though, that the Modi machine only recently got 30,000 designer kurtas with Namo, anocrym for Narendra Modi, embossed on them and another 30,000 burqas stitched for distribution at strategically important meetings. Assured of support by many corporates as well as substantial donations received from the prosperous oversees Gujarati community, money has never been a problem for Modi.
The Saharanpur riots have forced Jats and upper castes in the State to reconsider their position vis-a-vis the BJP. It is believed that these two significant segments have lost faith in both Ajit Singh (UPA Minister and a known Jat leader) and other secular parties. Looking back the BJP leaders believe that the slide in the party’s fortunes in the State owed not a little to its having veered away from the hardcore Hindutva agenda. And that’s where Amit Shah comes in as a factor. While other leaders have been thinking of wooing alienated sections like the Muslims or the low and backward casts, Shah’s preoccupation for many long months has been the consolidation of the Hindu vote. And given his reputation/notoriety as Modi’s Home Minister in Gujarat his credentials as a Hindu nationalist are well established. Witness his post-Godhra massacre days in Gujarat, an undoubted asset for Modi.
With Shah around, Modi can surely play up to the Muslims in UP on his own in an attempt to wean away, as many of them as he can from the secular bandwagon. And, fortunately, for him, the UP Muslims are politically adrift just now. There is no genuine Muslim leadership worth the name in existence; Muslims are disenchanted with Mulayam Singh Yadav and his son; Mayawati, too, has lost some of her previous charm: and the Congress, stands accused of having treated Muslims as a vote bank in the past, therefore, fit to be shunned. I am not suggesting that this gives the BJP a virtual free hand to toy with the Muslim vote. Far from it; there is no love lost between the two, given the level of mutual distrust. I say this regardless of what some Maulana or the other might have to say.
It’s quite likely in this context that Modi may choose not to strike a particularly strident note in Kanpur; he will continue to depend on Amit Shah and the other RSS outfits to consolidate the Hindu base. The RSS front organizations are expected to mobilize and consolidate the Sadhu Samaj and its ilk, to keep up an overtly religious pitch throughout the election season.
Simultaneously, the RSS and some of its intellectual fronts will ensure that the youth are made fully aware of the dangers faced from Pakistan and its strong Talibinisation record. The internet database will be used to extensively highlight the machinations of Pakistan and highlight the ill-preparedness of the UPA government to meet the challenge from across the border. It is this soft-State argument against the UPA that Modi will play up in his UP campaign.
Modi, who is projecting himself as a pro-development man of late, may personally avoid communal rhetoric to protect his carefully nurtured aura needed to counter the communalist stigma attached to the name Modi after Godhra.
Modi, it is said, will steer clear of the temple issue, he will keep firing away at Pakistan and the UPA’s failure to control cross-border terror. Hindu chauvinism may work for the BJP, especially in Uttar Pradesh, where it is working hard to tap hordes of kar sevaks (volunteers) it had once collected for the demolition of the Babri Masjid. These leaderless often unemployed men, have long nursed anger against Muslim appeasement. The Modi campaign is just the kind of shot-in-the-arm they need.
With the BJP’s fortunes having taken a nosedive for nearly a decade, this dormant force is being wooed afresh in the name of Narendra Modi, the messiah who will deliver. By concentrating the party’s attack on Pakistan and the Jihadi forces like the Taliban, India the Modi campaign hopes, to avoid a confrontationist stance against the Muslims and instead use development, rather than appeasement, as the tool to help rebuild the country. Given Modi’s track record it may at best to be a gamble when it comes to winning over the Muslim vote. But then the thrust of the national campaign will be on getting the Hindu vote back. Muslims would only be a bonus.
Follow our WhatsApp channel